Duke of Edinburgh - Plaque Presentation

On Thursday 26th April HRH The Earl of Wessex visited Portsmouth. As part of this visit schools who are running the Duke of Edinburgh put on a showcase of the award across the city at UTC for the Earl to see. Redwood Park has started running the award this year so were invited to be a part of this. Aiden, Harry and Kevin represented Redwood and what we have achieved over the last year.

We chose to demonstrate to the Earl how we are making dragonflies out of pieces of Willow, having learning how to sauce the wood, lash the wool and create something very special that will be sold at a local farmers market in the near future. The students did an amazing job at engaging the Earl, who knelt down to see what they were doing. They answered his questions with amazing clarity and insight about how and what DofE means to them and to Redwood Park. The pupil’s then presented the Earl with one of the dragonflies to take away with him. Once the Earl had left the students repeated the demonstration to the Mayor and High Sherriff of Portsmouth, who gave them their first sale, buying a dragonfly from them.

At the end of the experience we were presented with our official plaque for now being a licenced DofE centre. The pupils had an amazing time and were so proud of themselves for the way they communicated and interacted with a large number of VIP’s and in a room of their mainstream peers also taking part in the DofE award.